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Suddenly, everyone I know has a blog. Mostly, they talk about their day, their dog, their job and their friends. A few have blogs devoted to a specific topic - a hobby or their area of professional expertise. And all are enjoying the freedom of self-publication.
It reminds me of the early days of the web - anyone could be a publisher. There weren’t standards or benchmarks, we just sorta made it up as we went along. Back then, being an expert meant using synergy at least twice in every three sentences and making up cool new multi-syllabic words. Talking to a web expert in those days involved more confusion than communication.
At least we’re over that false arrogance now. And that’s what makes me so excited at the prospect of blogging. It isn’t (yet) a commercialized medium. Graphics, audio, video and html markup code are relatively absent. People just write what they think. Or hear. Or see.
The beautiful thing about blogs is that you don’t make money from them. That leaves them relatively un-encumbered from avaricious commercial bias; that horrible practise of “softening” the editorial to appease the advertisers.
What’s all this got to do with marketing? I’m so glad you asked!
Bloggers CAN talk about you in their posts. They CAN provide links to cool things that you’ve done or good information you provide. And much like the newsgroups of old, you CAN let them know what you’re up to, if you do it carefully and don’t spam them.
Forums like blogging challenge us to excercise our marketing muscle and refuse to settle for tired, overworked and obvious campaigns. So dust off those funky viral marketing ideas, put on your creative hats and come up with something worth talking about. Do it well, and with blogging, it will be.
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